#10 Jacques Henri Lartigue

Zissou, Rouzat, 1911

Jacques-Henri Lartigue (1894-1986) was born at Courbevoie, France, and he grew up in Paris. He took his first photographs at the age of six, using his father’s camera, and started keeping what would become a lifelong diary. In 1904 he began making photographs and drawings of family games and childhood experiences, also capturing the beginnings of aviation and cars and the smart women of the Bois de Boulogne as well as society and sporting events such as the Coupe Gordon Bennett and the French Grand Prix, early flights of aviation pioneers.

My Brother, Zissou, Gets His Glider Airbourne, 1908

Drag-racing Day at the Auteuil Races, Paris, 1911

he sold a few photographs to sporting magazines during his middle-ages he concentrated on painting which also was his source of income and living. However, he continued taking photographs and maintained written journals about them throughout his life. At age of 69 his boyhood photographs were 'discovered' by Charles Rado of the Rapho agency who introduced Lartigue to John Szarkowski, curator of the Museum of Modern Art, who arranged an exhibition of his work at the museum. Life magazine published the photos in 1963.

Zissou contre le vent de l'helice d'Amerigo, Buc, 1911

Sala, at the Rocher de la Vierge, Biarritz, 1927

Aquarium (France, 1929)

Although best known as a photographer, Lartigue was also a good painter. He often showed-up in the official salons in Paris and in the south of France from 1922.

‘Rushmore’ by Wes Anderson (1998) @00:01:37
Four photos by Jacques Henri Lartigue are visible on the wall behind Max

American director Wes Anderson is a fan of Lartigue's work, and has referenced it in his films. (His film is great, especially in the aesthetic and visual aspects) A shot in Rushmore is based on one of his photographs, and Lartigue's likeness was the basis for the portrait of Lord Mandrake in The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou. (#)